The moment I woke, the air was wrong.
Too still.
Too clean.
Kael sat a few feet away, blade in her lap, eyes wide open but unfocused. Frozen mid-blink.
The wind had stopped.
The sky? No longer red.
Just… blank.
Gray.
Flat.
Like a stage waiting for a script.
[Override Level: RED][Anomaly has breached Anchor Layer One][Deploying: CUSTODIAN]
A ripple passed through the valley.
No sound.
Just correction.
Gravestones cracked and reformed. Echoes vanished. Names blurred. Entire paths I remembered walking were rewritten mid-thought.
Kael flickered once—her position rewinding two seconds, then resetting.
My mind screamed.
Not in pain.
In resistance.
Then it appeared.
At the edge of the valley.
Walking without walking.
Seven feet tall.
White robes like a priest or judge. No face. Just a hole where a face should be. Behind the hole: stars. Spiraling equations. Glitch-light bleeding from the gaps in its frame.
The Custodian.
It raised one hand.
Spoke a word that wasn't a word.
And suddenly—
[UNBOUND STATUS: STRIPPED][CLASS: RESET TO DRUDGE][HP: 10 | STR: 1 | INT: ∞ | LUCK: -30][Skill Access: NULL][TRAITS: SEALED][AUTHORITY LEVEL: ERASED]
I choked.
Dropped to one knee.
My thoughts slowed. Vision blurred. Data-processing dropped from lightning to lag.
I tried to run calculations—
But I couldn't even remember how to multiply.
The world became too big again.
The Custodian walked forward, calm as a god deleting prayers.
"Don't…" Kael gasped, struggling to move. "Don't let it take you…"
She was locked. Mid-motion.
The system was reprogramming her.
Rewriting her choices.
And me?
I was next.
"Do not resist, Strategist. This correction is permanent."
The voice wasn't human.
It was narrative itself. The voice of "what should be." Cold. Logical. Final.
And yet…
Beneath the fear…
Something sparked.
Deep inside my head.
A sound.
A glitch.
Not from the system.
From me.
🧾 [ERROR: Core Lock Breach]
Source: UNKNOWNAccessing Memory Loop [0]...Unlocking Trait: "Last Echo"
🎖 New Trait: [Last Echo]You are not the first Itsuki Amagi to live.But you may be the last.One version of you survived everything.That version left behind instructions.Instructions only you can read.
Suddenly I saw it.
Not with my eyes.
With hyper-cognition.
An invisible diagram etched into reality.
The Custodian's movement arc. Power origin. Input lag. Recursive logic core.
It moved like an invincible god.
But it thought like a computer.
And computers?
I could break.
I surged to my feet.
Not fast.
Not strong.
But correct.
"Override this," I said.
And then I moved.
The Custodian struck.
An impossible blade formed from light and story and rules.
I ducked before it swung.
Precalculated its angle based on quantum input delay.
Slid under the strike.
Grabbed a broken fragment of gravestone — not for the damage.
For the symbolism.
And jammed it into the opening of its chest cavity.
[Gravestone: Unregistered Variable][Symbolic Conflict Engaged][Narrative Contamination: 7%... 12%... 29%...]
The system screamed.
🧾 [TRAITS RESTORED]🧾 [CLASS UNBOUND: REESTABLISHED]🧾 [YOU HAVE REJECTED REWRITING]
The Custodian staggered.
And for the first time…
It spoke with fear.
"You are the fault that propagates."
"You are the glitch in the pattern."
I stood there, bleeding, panting, grinning through cracked lips.
"You're damn right I am."
And I drove the stone deeper.
[CUSTODIAN STATUS: TERMINAL CORRUPTION][FORCE RECALL INITIATED][ERROR: CAN'T DELETE PLAYER FROM OUTSIDE THE BOARD]
The light collapsed inward.
The valley snapped.
Time shuddered.
And the Custodian vanished.
Silence.
Real silence this time.
Kael unfroze.
Fell to her knees, eyes wide, body shaking.
"What… what did you just do?"
I looked up at the sky.
The red had returned.
But it watched me differently now.
Like a player it couldn't place on the board.
"I broke its pen," I said.
Kael looked at me like I was either the messiah or the final boss.
Maybe both.